skeptic's blog

Is ITIL Dead in the Water?

Submitted by skeptic on Sat, 2006-07-29 09:30

This article has been podcast

[Updated: mention of COBIT]

In five years time most organisations will consider ISO/IEC 20000 certification as a normal part of operating: a minimum benchmark. The horse has bolted with ISO/IEC 20000: the world sees it as “the ITIL standard” but OGC and itSMF have zero control of it.

Our domain name is changing

Submitted by skeptic on Sat, 2006-07-22 04:38

The ITIL Skeptic becomes the IT Skeptic. The domain name is changing from itilskeptic.org to http://www.itskeptic.org. The new address works now: please update your links.

IBM: the company with such a firm grasp of ITIL strategic issues that they sold their service desk

Submitted by skeptic on Mon, 2006-07-17 07:41

Is it just me or does anyone else think it is a bit rich IBM lecturing ITIL vendors?

After all, this is the company with such a firm grasp of ITIL strategic issues that they sold their service desk product to Peregrine, abandoned to an inevitable brutal death. That's a bit like GM getting out of making engines and then telling other auto makers what they need to make cars.

Life beyond ITIL

Submitted by skeptic on Mon, 2006-07-17 06:59

Sorry about the lack of heavy entries lately folks - a trifle busy right now. I'll get time to work on "living without CMDB" soon I promise.

The observant ones amongst you will note the banner at the top has changed from "the ITIL Skeptic" to "the IT Skeptic". I'll gradually change the name everywhere. This move was inspired by Web 2.0. I decided Web 2.0 involves too much silliness for the Skeptic to resist. I had already been itching to have a go at SOA and other targets but Web 2.0 was the last straw.

Do unto yourself before others do unto you

Submitted by skeptic on Wed, 2006-07-12 01:23

Joe at Evergreen makes a great point

Whether it’s ITIL or some other initiative or project, eventually someone in the organization (usually someone with authority) will ask the proverbial "so what". Other questions they might and should ask include "why did we do this" and, of course, "what was the ROI".

What a load of .... Computerworld: How Much Is 'Just Enough' for a CMDB?

Submitted by skeptic on Sat, 2006-07-01 11:32

This article has been podcast in slightly modified form.

Antonio gave us an interesting link in a recent comment. Excuse me folks, but what a load of crap it is.

"A just-enough CMDB should provide a full picture of the following:
All technology components related to the specific service.

ITIL’s dead elephant: CMDB can't be done

Submitted by skeptic on Mon, 2006-06-26 22:17

Note: this is the original "dead elephant" post from back in 2006. My thinking about CMDB has matured since then. Please see the articles (and book) in the sidebar of this article for a more complete picture of how I now see CMDB, and a much wider range of ideas why CMDB or CMS is - for most organisations - a bad idea.

This article has been podcast

CMDB can’t be done. Not as ITIL defines it. At least not with a justifiable return on the investment of doing it - it is such an enormous undertaking that any organisation attempting it is going to burn money on an irresponsible scale. The truth about CMDB is no secret. It is a “dead elephant”: a great putrescence in the corner of the room that everyone studiously ignores, stepping around it and ignoring the stench, because life will be so much simpler if they do not acknowledge the obvious.

Many ITIL projects are overcapitalised renovations

Submitted by skeptic on Sat, 2006-06-24 10:05

I have been discussing ITIL ROI with the Spanish ITIL community, via Antonio Valle's blog with the magnificent name "Gobierno de las TIC. Conocimiento Adquirido". I was asked the question “How is the relationship between an architectural project and a house?”.

Unless one is setting up a data centre from scratch, I don't think the architect analogy fits. An ITIL adoption is usually more like renovations.

If IT ain’t broke don’t fix it.

Submitted by skeptic on Tue, 2006-06-13 10:31

This article has been podcast

Perhaps the saddest sight in the ITIL world is organisations that adopt ITIL processes when the old ones were working OK. Don’t tell me it doesn’t happen.

The Emperor has no clothes. Where is the evidence for ITIL?

Submitted by skeptic on Sun, 2006-06-11 07:08

This article has been podcast

Since this is a skeptical blog, it is high time we examined the evidence. Where is the evidence for the benefits of ITIL? There isn’t any. Not the kind of hard empirical evidence that would stand up in, say, clinical trials. There is more evidence for quack alternative medicines than there is for ITIL.

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